Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Mary Mallon/archive1: Difference between revisions

Mary Mallon (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

As of 30 January 2026, 12:31 (UTC), this page is active and open for discussion. An FAC coordinator will be responsible for closing the nomination.

Nominator(s): SchroCat (talk) 13:03, 29 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The name “Typhoid Mary” is casually bandied about, often in a joking manner, aimed at that friend or family member who passes on a cold or some other ailment. But there was a real person behind the name, a good cook, whose refusal to believe she was carrying the typhoid virus led to her being incarcerated for over a quarter of a century. This article has been through a complete rewrite recently and any vestiges of my British writing have been expunged by Ssilvers and Wehwalt; Tim riley was also most helpful at the PR. Huge thanks to all three. Any further constructive comments are most welcome. – SchroCat (talk) 13:03, 29 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

May I list a couple of nitpicks regarding the bacteriology?

• Here “infected up to fifty-seven people with typhoid fever”. This is not really correct. One can’t really be infected with the disease, one is infected by the bacteria, which cause the disease.
• Here “an asymptomatic carrier of the Salmonella typhi bacteria” since bacteria is the plural of bacterium, we need to omit the definite article.

More general comments to follow (if I have any to offer). Graham Beards (talk) 14:39, 29 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks Graham. Those two points addressed and I look forward to any more you have. Cheers – SchroCat (talk) 08:41, 30 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

RoySmith

• Mary had some schooling, but the level of her education is not known should be rephrased to avoid WP:CLOP of https://doi.org/10.1093/anb/9780198606697.article.1202080.
• Soper—with his colleague B. Raymond Hoobler—then visited Mallon at her rooming house on Third Avenue that she shared with Briehof.[1] The source doesn’t mention Hoobler, or a rooming house on Third Avenue.
• she emigrated to the United States aboard the Ethiopia I guess this is OK, but perhaps better to clarify “the steamship Ethiopia”.
• It needs a map. I’ve added one.

  That’s great – thank you very much! – SchroCat (talk) 12:00, 30 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

(more to come)

• Mallon worked as a cook for several families, four of whom contracted typhoid fever four people or four families contracted the disease? It sounds like the latter, but I’m not sure what it means for a family to contract a disease.
• a guest became ill with typhoid ten days after he arrived to stay with the family how does ten days compare with the typical incubation time of typhoid?
• came to the conclusion that the footman was the person those of us who watched Downton Abbey know what a footman is, but you should explain it for the rest of the readership.
• According to Leavitt, this dish “would have been an excellent medium for typhoid infection”.[5][15] Leavitt is a biographer/historian. How does that qualify her to say what would make an excellent growth medium? I assume she’s really reporting what somebody else (qualified to make such a statement) said?

  She was referring to Soper’s report, which I’ve now added, but the information was also covered by the other source that was there – (Adler & Mara 2016). – SchroCat (talk) 12:28, 30 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

• Leavitt believes that William Randolph Hearst’s newspaper, the New York American … That links to New York Journal-American which says it started publication in 1937. I’m guessing you want to link directly to the “New York American” section.
• Her duties included general cleaning, washing bottles, recording results clarify that “Her” refers to Mallon, not Plavaska.
• On December 4, 1932, she suffered a major one. She was transferred to a ward at the hospital and remained there paralyzed and bedridden was she bedridden for all 6 years before she died?

• Between 1938 and the advent of HIV/AIDS need a year for HIV/AIDS.
• The phrase Typhoid Mary is now a colloquial term for anyone who spreads disease Is that you saying that, or is it in Foss 2020?

  Neither. It’s sourced to two things (the OED and Wawrzynczak), although I could have added another five or six sources if needed. – SchroCat (talk) 12:00, 30 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

OK, that’s it from me for a first pass. RoySmith (talk) 00:27, 30 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Image review